I am a Burmese exile taking a near-permanent refuge in New York and Sydney. Here are my essays about Burma and anything else I feel like writing about. And posting the articles I like from selected sites. Bridging Burma to the world this Blog is more of a Politically-Oriented Literary Blog than a Plain News Blog or a Sophisticated Thoughts Blog.

Thursday, May 15, 2014

Indonesian Sharia-Police Gang-Raping & Caning Women

A young widow in Aceh, Indonesia will
be caned for having an affair with a married man under the province’s sharia
law after being gang-raped by her accusers.

Extramarital affairs are strictly
forbidden in the province, where sharia law governing behavior was adopted in
February for both Muslims and non-Muslims alike. Sharia vigilante groups,
although officially illegal, are “common and even condoned by the local clergy
and authorities.”

In this case, the vigilantes – composed of eight men, including a 13-year-old
boy – broke into the woman’s home and allegedly caught the couple about to
engage in sex. The accused man is 40 years old and married.

The vigilantes proceeded to tie up the man, after which he was beaten.
The woman was taken to another room and raped by each man. Afterwards they
doused the couple in sewage before taking them to the authorities for the crime
of “tarnishing the village’s reputation.”

The city’s sharia police, the Wilayatul
Hisbah, announced that the couple would be caned for committing adultery.

“We want the couple to be caned because they violated the religious
bylaw on sexual relations,” said Ibrahim Latif, the head of the shariah office
in the eastern town of Langsa. Ibrahim said the fact that the woman had been
raped would not be taken into consideration when prosecuting her for the crime.

“They have to be [caned] as a form of justice because the rapists will
also be processed, but in a criminal court,” he said. “Besides, they’ve confessed to having sex on several previous occasions,
even though the man is married and has five children.”

Islamist Province of Aceh.

According to sharia law instituted in the province, the couple could
each publicly receive nine cane strokes. Commenting on the case, Nursiti, the
head of a women’s empowerment group in ACeh, said, “Instead of protecting the victim of this heinous crime, the
authorities want to have her caned. What kind of government is this that won’t
protect its citizens?”

A week after the rape, the woman was
still being held by authorities.

To date, three of the rapists have been
found and arrested, including the 13-year-old. Under sharia, they would have
received the same number of cane strokes as the victims, however, the rapists
will be tried under Aceh’s criminal law system. Police said they know the identities
of the other five rapists and asked their families to turn them in.

Teungku Faisal Ali, the head of Aceh’s
chapter of Nahdlatul Ulama, the country’s largest Islamic organization, agrees
with that the couple should face the full sharia punishment for the crime, but
also wants the rapists to be tried under both sharia and criminal law. “The
punishment for the mob that raped the victim must be much harsher because they
have set back efforts to uphold shariah in Aceh.”

In other cases of sharia vigilantism in the province, a 20-year-old
university student was raped by three shariah police officers in Langsa in
January 2010 for riding on a motorcycle with her boyfriend.

In that case, two of the rapists were
caught, tried and each sentenced to eight years in prison. The third
perpetrator remains at large to date. The town’s shariah police chief was also
fired.

A unit of Sharia-Police force (Wilayatul Hisbah) in Indonesia.

Indonesian Sharia-Police patrolling the streets.

Ismail Hasani, a scholar at Jakarta’s
Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University, said, “Sure, the law has to be enforced, but a punishment like caning is
excessive…. The punishment is imposed based on sexual imagination instead of
legal facts. Historically, caning in Islam is implemented strictly based on
strong evidence. But in Aceh, it is done arbitrarily. The enforcement of the
shariah law is done based on prejudice and even for political reasons.”

The national government, for its part,
has remained silent on the issue. All provinces in Indonesia are given a large
degree of autonomy, but Aceh, in particular, is one of three provinces that
have extra autonomous status according to a 2005 peace accord signed to end a
violent 30-year struggle for autonomy by the Islamist Free Aceh Movement.

Part of the peace accord allows the establishment of sharia laws
governing behavior in the province, including the prohibition of close contact
between men and women who are not related to each other, the prohibition of
alcohol and the selling and public consumption of food during Ramadan; the
obligation of women to wear a hijab (Islamic head covering) as well as
prohibiting them from wearing tight pants and straddling motorcycles, among
other restrictions.

Indonesian Sharia-police enforcing Islamist Headbag on streets.

Indonesian Sharia-police enforcing no-bike-riding law for females.
(The young woman rider was raped and caned for her offence.)

Christian schoolgirls beheaded by Sharia-vigilantes in Indonesia.

Young couples arrested by notorious Indonesian Sharia-Police for necking.